


Learning Empathy

by TriDogMom



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Body Swap, Draco experiences a period, F/M, HP International Witches Day 2021, He is not a fan, Humor, I wanted him to suffer, No Beta- we die like women, Polyjuice Potion, no regrets
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-05
Updated: 2021-03-05
Packaged: 2021-03-18 07:48:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,135
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29854893
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TriDogMom/pseuds/TriDogMom
Summary: After Hermione complains to Draco about the struggles of being a woman in the Ministry, he suggests they change places for a few hours. With the help of Polyjuice Potion, he learns what it's really like to be Hermione.
Relationships: Hermione Granger/Draco Malfoy
Comments: 49
Kudos: 112
Collections: International Witches Day





	Learning Empathy

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by Anonymous in the [International_Witches_Day](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/International_Witches_Day) collection. 



> **Prompt:**
> 
> Male character tries to understand what it's like to be a female.
> 
> **Happy International Witches Day!!!**

"It's almost the New Year, Granger," Draco said from the desk across from her. "Any resolutions?"

After the war, they had both started working in the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures. The head of the department, Richard Head, had made them partners. They had shared the same office, desks crammed in together, for the last four years.

Hermione had been hesitant to work with Draco at first. After a few uncomfortable weeks, they had aired all their differences and now worked well together. In fact, they were the most successful team in the Illegal Poaching department. She still wished they had a larger office, but all in all, sharing the space with Draco wasn't too bad.

"My only resolution is to not punch our boss in the throat for being a misogynistic wanker," Hermione huffed out. "Same as last year."

She had just come back from a meeting with Mr Head and, luckily for him, had left her wand in her office. He had not listened to a single thing she said, told her that her report couldn't be submitted until Draco signed off on it, and that she looked _especially pretty_.

"He's not that bad. He just likes me more than you."

"He only likes you more because you both have penises. I've detained more poachers than you, my paperwork is always perfect, and still, he doesn't respect me."

"I don't think–"

"You don't get it, Draco. And you never will. Being female is hard and people like Mr Head are the reason why. If you spent an _hour_ as me, you'd understand."

"Ok."

"What?" Hermione asked, unsure what he was agreeing to.

"How about for our resolution we can both learn some empathy," Draco explained. "We can take Polyjuice before a meeting and I will see if you really are treated differently. Then we'll have lunch in the cafeteria downstairs."

"And what will I be learning?"

"What it's like to be Draco Malfoy. I promise it's not as nice as people think it is."

"Okay," Hermione agreed. "But make sure you go to the bathroom before we change. I don't need you learning everything about me."

"I wouldn't have thought of that, but now I am. Kinky, Granger."

"Shut up, Malfoy."

* * *

"Are you ready?" Hermione asked.

They had a meeting in less than ten minutes and they were about to take Polyjuice to change places. Draco had obtained two phials from Severus that he promised would last three hours. Enough time for them to go to their meeting and lunch and not worry about it wearing off partway through.

He was a little nervous to switch bodies with his co-worker. He had no problems acting like her — in fact, he thought it might be a nice change to not be looked at with disdain from half the office — but he was a little concerned about what it would be like to have different body parts. How did women even cross their arms with breasts?

And even though he had already voided his bladder, what if hers was smaller than his or the potion lasted longer and he was forced to use the loo?

Or worse, what if she had to use the bathroom in his body?

He wasn't opposed to Granger touching his cock, he just wanted her to do it whilst it was attached to his body, not hers.

"As ready as I will be," he said. "Here you go."

He handed her a pile of his clothes for her to wear and took hers in return. He picked up the lacy bra and held it in front of his face. He'd seen plenty of them in his life, but now that he was about to wear one, he was a little concerned about how exactly to put it on. Plus, there was no way it would fit on him before he changed. He wasn't a large man, but he was much broader in the chest than Hermione.

He kept his eyes down as he listened to her change into his clothing, determined to respect her privacy and not look.

"Why aren't you changing?" she asked.

"Because the clothes won't fit."

"Buggar. Okay, well do it after we drink, just try not to be a pervert as you change."

Draco rolled his eyes but slipped his clothes off so he was just in his pants. Plucking a hair from his head, he dropped it into the phial of Polyjuice potion before handing it to Hermione and taking her sample. They clinked bottles and he drank it in one swallow.

His skin felt like it was bubbling and he felt himself shrinking and his hair growing at a rapid speed. It was heavy on his head and he pushed it over his shoulders, already trying to figure out how in the hell Hermione didn't have headaches all day long. The pain of the transition was lessening and he picked up the bra and put his arms through the straps.

Reaching behind his back, he tried to bring the two sides together to hook but he kept dropping one or the other. Or he would think he had it hooked and it would pop open. Hermione lightly laughed and took pity on him, coming to help him close it.

"It's easier if you hook it in the front, then turn it around and put your arms in," she explained in his deep voice. "I thought this would be the easier part for you. Don't you have experience with bras?"

"Is that really what I sound like?" he asked. "No wonder women like it when I talk dirty to them. It's nice. And I'll have you know that I am used to taking them _off_ tits, not putting them back on."

She laughed and he could imagine the way her head would be shaking. "If you say so, Draco."

"When does this pain stop?" Draco asked, reaching behind him to rub his lower back. "The rest of me feels fine, but my back and lower stomach are killing me."

"That's not the potion," Hermione said. She walked in front of him and handed him a square package that was soft and wrapped in plastic. He tried to raise his left eyebrow at her, but evidently, it wasn't something she was capable of and he felt both raise. "Those are period cramps. And with Polyjuice you can't take pain potions. This is a pad."

He turned the package over. "What in the bloody fuck am I supposed to do with it?"

"You put it in your knickers. When the blood leaves your body, the pad collects it so it doesn't run down your leg. That one will last the entire time. It's the first day of my period so I apologise, but it's a heavy flow day."

"Your… you mean… I'm bleeding from your vagina? And you wear this diaper to collect it? What if someone smells it? Or it falls out? Or I bleed to death? And how in the fuck am I supposed to present something when I feel like I am being stabbed in the back and stomach?"

"You wanted to know what it was like to be me, now you know. If you like, I can show you how to put in a tampon."

"What is that?" He wasn't sure he wanted to know.

"It's a piece of cotton that you put in your vagina and it absorbs the blood before it leaves your body. It has a string so when it's time you change it, you can pull it out."

Draco stared at her in horror. A tampon sounded like a cotton dildo that was not sexy at all. And women went through this _every_ month? How did they function? He already felt like crying because it was so painful. Not to mention the fact that he was suddenly ravenous and yet not hungry. And he felt like he needed to empty his bowels. He was standing in his office in nothing but his pants and her bra and he felt like he was in the middle of a personal summer, sweat running down his back.

"I would prefer to not have something shoved up my bits, if you don't mind," he said irritably. "Just show me how to put this pad thing on. And just so you know, it would have been nice to get some fucking warning that my cunt was going to spew blood all over the place, Granger."

"Tell me about it, Malfoy," she snapped. "I never get any warning either. Unless you count the months I'm lucky enough to bloat and cry for three days beforehand."

"And I thought you went to the bathroom before? Why do I feel like I need to shit?"

"That's just your muscles cramping. They're the same muscles you use when you go to the bathroom so it feels like you need to poo, but you don't. At least not right now. Who knows what will happen later. You'll either be constipated or have diarrhoea. There is no in-between."

"I'm going to Avada you," he growled.

"You can do that later. Right now we need to get to the meeting." She unwrapped the pad and placed it in the knickers before handing it to her. "There is adhesive on it so it won't fall out. Put them on and let's go."

Draco dressed and shuddered as he pulled the knickers on. It was like having a diaper between his legs and he didn't know how to stand so he didn't feel it. He reached into the waistband of his skirt and pulled them up tighter. He didn't want to risk walking without it being flush against his body.

* * *

As soon as the meeting was over, Draco stood up, left his papers behind for Hermione, the traitorous bitch, to collect as he half-ran to the bathroom. He was halfway into the men's room when he cursed and went into the women's. Slamming the cubicle door, he hiked his skirt around his waist and pulled his knickers down.

He felt like he had just made it to the toilet in time to avoid a rather smelly accident but when he tried to push — which was an odd sensation in someone else's body — nothing happened. Maybe Hermione was right.

He was already shocked by what he had learned in the meeting. He and Hermione had put the presentation together as a team but anytime he went to talk about something, Mr Head would cut him off and ask her to explain it. When he had finally been allowed to speak, their boss cut him off and then his boss had proceeded to explain to him what he had been trying to say.

The nerve of the man, explaining something to him when he had written the damn thing!

And Hermione just sat there and smirked. Except for the one time when she patted his arm and whispered in her ear that ' _he just likes me more than you.'_

Deciding his bowels weren't about to explode he went to stand up when he looked at his knickers.

"AHHHHHHHH!"

He didn't even care that he sounded like a terrified girl as he screamed. He was dying! Right there on his pad, surrounded by blood, was a large glob of something. Hermione must have been pregnant and he had just birthed a baby.

"Draco?" Hermione yelled in his voice and he heard her ward the loo. "What's wrong?"

"I think you just gave birth! There is–" he gagged as he looked at it again. "There is a… thing."

Hermione unlocked the cubicle and entered, looking at his knickers. She rolled her eyes before grabbing some toilet paper. Taking the wad in her hand, she pulled the baby from the pad and picked it up, dropping it between his legs and into the toilet.

"Don't be such a wimp, Draco. It's just your uterine lining."

"My WHAT? Why is it coming out? Doesn't that need to stay in there?"

She giggled, which sounded creepy in his deep voice, and shook her head. "They really need to teach Sex-Ed at Hogwarts. Come on, we need to get to lunch before all the good tables are taken."

"Nothing sounds good," he pouted.

"Not even chocolate cake?" she teased.

"Maybe the cake."

* * *

After washing their hands, they made their way into the cafeteria. Hermione, taking pity on Draco, told him to find an empty table and she would bring him lunch. She knew he wasn't actually her, he was only wearing skin that looked like her, but she was pretty sure her body would still be craving the same thing it did the first day of every period. Anything fried and salted followed by the biggest slice of chocolate cake she could find.

Getting in the line for chips and kebabs, she was thinking over the meeting when someone knocked into her.

"Death Eaters shouldn't be allowed to work here," the unknown person said.

They had a friend standing next to them that nodded. "Your mum should have swallowed that night."

"I bet the best part of him ran down her leg."

Hermione kept her face blank and turned away even though she wanted to yell at them. How dare they talk to Draco that way! He, like the rest of them, had been children in their parents' war. None of them asked for the life they had. And Draco had grown up and become the opposite of who he had been.

He was hard-working, generous with his donations, and championed for rights for creatures alongside her every day. If she, Harry, and Ron could forgive him, anyone could. She could guarantee these cunts had never talked to Draco beyond spewing hatred at him. And if she knew Draco, he just took it.

They were going to have words about this. No one deserved to be talked to like that and she wasn't going to let it happen again. Even if she had to punch each one of them in the mouth. Well, she'd end up just taking them to HR, but it would be a nice administrative knuckle sandwich.

Getting their food, she carried it over to the table Draco had found in the corner and sat down across from him. He reached for his plate and yelped in pain, causing people to turn and look at them.

"What in the bloody fuck?" he growled, gripping his breast.

"What happened?" she asked, not noticing anything amiss.

"Something is poking me in the tit. Ouch! It's fucking sharp."

"Move your hand." He put his arm in the air and she immediately saw the problem. Through the fitted shirt, she could see something poking out that only meant one thing, the underwire of her bra had snapped. "Hold still."

She raised her wand and sent a quick clothing repairing spell at the bra and he breathed a sigh of relief.

"It's bad enough your nipples feel like they're in a vice grip and each move sends a shot of pain through your tits, do I really need to get stabbed too?"

"Sorry. My breasts get really sensitive on the first day of my period."

"I don't know how you live like this, Granger. It's bloody awful. And Mr Head was horrible to you in the meeting. Is it really always like that?"

Hermione took a deep breath before answering him and telling him the truth. That Mr Head was actually _worse_ when she met with him in private. She confessed about the comments he made about her appearance, the way he tried to look down her top, or the way his eyes lingered on her. Then she told him that Mr Head wasn't the only one that did it. That she had to deal with that same kind of treatment from ninety percent of the men in the Ministry.

"Is there anything I can do?" he asked.

"Yes, there is," she told him. "You can call people out when they make comments like that. When Mr Head ignores me only to talk to you, you can direct him back to me. Show him that you consider us to be equal. Sometimes change takes people who are willing to stand up to their friends and colleagues." She paused for a moment, thinking about being in the lunch line earlier. "And, I'm sorry I accused you of having a perfect life. I heard what people said about you. It's not right, Draco."

"I know. But snapping at them doesn't work so I just try to ignore them."

"If I ever hear it again, they are going to get more than a cold shoulder from me. They'll get my wand up their arse. You're too good to be treated like that."

Tears welled in his eyes and he hurriedly swiped them away. "Why in the bloody fuck am I crying, Granger?"

"Welcome to period hormones. Aren't they great?"

"They're awful."

* * *

Draco thought about what Hermione had said as they finished up their lunch. He knew he'd made insensitive comments over the years. Anytime he was short with her, he blamed it on her period and made a comment about 'emotional women'. Well, no wonder they were emotional. Not only was their own body attacking them month after month, but people like their boss were also treating them like lesser beings. All because they weren't men.

He knew he was only one person but he was determined to make changes in his own life to make sure he wasn't treating women that way.

He had suggested this body-swap as a joke, a way to prove to Hermione that being female wasn't as hard as she made it out to be. Merlin was he wrong.

They stood to dump their trays when Potter approached them to say hello. Harry went to hug him and he stepped back, unwilling to hug the prat or have his overly sensitive nipples smashed anymore than the torture device women called a bra was doing.

"Merlin, Hermione. Are you on your period or something?"

How fucking _dare_ Potter ask him that? Didn't he know what it was like to be on your period? The pain, the fear of blood gushing everywhere? Not to mention the fact that he thought he was going to expel his bowels at any moment yet didn't have to… unless he really did have to. Fuck, was he about to crap his pants?

"Yes, Potter I am actually. And it's bloody painful. So why don't you shut the fuck up? Now if you'll excuse me, I have to use the loo. Again."

He relished the shocked look on his face as he stomped out of the cafeteria. _That'll teach Potter to say that again._

**Author's Note:**

> All the thanks in the world to Deviant Hufflepuff for not letting me give up on this story. I was afraid it was too light for a feminist collection but she reminded me that feminism comes in all forms, even humour.


End file.
